Apple has always pushed the envelope when it comes to laptop design, but this year the company took innovation to new heights. Apple began 2008 by -- the smallest Mac laptop ever made -- at the Macworld Expo. Although light on ports, hard drive space and processing power, the MacBook Air remains a beautiful machine and still offers one of the best laptop screens on the market -- complete with stellar LED backlighting.

The Air also introduced touch-screen support for to the Mac. Built on the same technology that allows iPhone and iPod Touch users to scroll, pinch and pivot on-screen objects by gesturing with more than one finger, the Air -- and all MacBooks introduced since its arrival -- allows users to use gestures to manipulate objects on their screens in all kinds of ways in a variety of applications. The result is a successful re-imagining of the how a trackpad can be used as an input device.

Apple didn't stop with the MacBook Air. It also released MacBook Pro updates that incorporated some of the innovations introduced on the Air. But the biggest innovation in MacBook design came in October, when Apple released a new line of MacBooks. The "unibody" MacBooks are built using a unique manufacturing process that carves the entire notebook case , resulting in decreased weight and increased sturdiness.

The new MacBooks continued the pioneering of multitouch gestures and eschewed the standard trackpad button by using the trackpad's surface itself as a button, allowing for a larger touch-sensitive surface. And never being a company to shy away from new technologies, Apple introduced a new display connector for these laptops -- the .

A new big cat on the way